Tonight On 20/20

Either Ferdinand Augello is guilty as sin or the prosecutors who are trying to hang a murder on him are desperate as hell. There seems to be a public relations campaign to vilify Augello and it is getting more intense.

Tonight at 10 p.m. on 20/20, ABC’s “investigative journalism and news magazine,” the network will tell between 3.2 million and 3.5 million Friday night shut ins, the kind of people who think jury duty might be interesting, that James Kauffman arranged the murder of his wife April in May 2012 and that Augello, “a member of a biker group known as the Pagan Motorcycle Club,” helped him do it.

The episode is being heavily promoted by the network. This morning, People Magazine ran an “exclusive” advance that repeats many of the prosecutors’ accusations. Both ABC and People quote Kim Pack, April Kauffman’s daughter from a previous marriage. Pack describes her mother’s disintegrating marriage to a terrible man.

Very Bad Marriage

April Kauffman became a veteran’s advocate because James Kauffman told convincing lies about having been in the Special Forces in Vietnam. Pack says her mother “felt duped.” Pack tells a disheartening tale of how bad marriages can get and she says that when she arrived at her mother’s house and was told by police that it was a murder scene she looked at her stepfather and said, “Well, you can go right over there, because that’s the person that killed my mom.”

It is possible that James Kauffman, who is dead now, might dispute the story. Kauffman remarried after the murder and the show doesn’t ask Kauffman’s widow what kind of man she thinks he was. It portrays him as vile. That is probably how he will be remembered.

The show doesn’t examine what Augello did to contribute to the dead woman’s murder or why the Garden State is trying to hang that murder around Augello’s neck. And because the show is prepackaged it will leave viewers blissfully ignorant of what happened in court yesterday.

Joe Mulholland

Yesterday, an unsavory character named Joseph Mullholland pled guilty to second degree racketeering and agreed to testify against Augello and the other remaining defendants. Mulholland was one of eight people, including Augello and James Kauffman, charged with first degree racketeering in January. Kauffman killed himself two weeks after he was charged with murder. He left a suicide note that has not been released to the defendant’s lawyers.

Yesterday Mullholland confessed that Augello was “the boss” of a drug distribution scheme. He said that James Kauffman would provide him with drugs which he would bring to Augello. He said Augello would pay $1,000 each time he ferried drugs from Kauffman to Augello.

Mullholland was not a Pagan. He was a patient of Kauffman’s. He never said a thing at the hearing about April Kauffman’s murder but he has told Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office Detective James Scoppa Jr. that he was an accessory to it.

Who Kauffman Hired

All along, police have alleged that April Kauffman was actually murdered by Mulholland’s cousin, a drug addict named Francis Mulholland. Like his brother, he was never a Pagan. Francis Mulholland died of a drug overdose a year after he put two bullets in April Kauffman. At the same time, police have alleged that the connection between James Kauffman and Francis Mulholland was Augello. But the connection was actually Francis Mulholland’s cousin Joe.

In a sworn statement, Scoppa said “Joseph advised us that on the morning of May 10th, 2012 at about 4:30 in the morning he picked up Francis Mulholland from his residence in Cape May County. They drove up in Joe’s white Silverado and drove directly to the area of Mainland High School. Joseph dropped off Francis on Route 9, right by the baseball fields at Mainland. Francis and Joe did not have a firearm when Francis got out of the car. Joseph then drove down to Somers Point to wait for Francis. Approximately a half hour later he received a phone call from Francis advising him that the job was complete and he killed April.”

A press release for tonight’s show states: “Augello pleaded not guilty to the charges and is currently awaiting trial. He declined ABC News’ requests for comment on the specifics of the charges, but during a jailhouse meeting and subsequent phone calls with an ABC News producer he insisted that he is not being treated fairly and authorities have acted inappropriately.”

The story 20/20 will tell tonight is a heart breaker that leaves little doubt that James Kauffman had his wife killed. But it is hardly a full and complete account of what happened. For example, how did this murder become a story about the Pagans? Unfortunately, the episode is closer to soap opera than “investigative journalism.”

23 Responses to “Tonight On 20/20”

FF
Good to hear you are well and resolved to moving forward into whatever comes your way. I had a massive life crash and it took a bit to get back up and running. Shit happens.
I hadn’t seen anything of you since the pic you sent me of you in Times Square a couple years ago.
Fentayl, oxcy and/or herion is a express train one way ticket to hell. Lost a few to that shit.
Keep it going and take care my friend.

Did dou watch any of that congressional hearing/strozk dog and pony show?

That’s who gets to decide who or what gets indicted.

“War on drugs”…. “War on terror”

I wish I could laugh but yet another kid (she was 23) I sat next to in AA meeting two weeks ago died from a fentanyl overdose.

Look…

Do I want to retire a happy man, or do I want to mete TRUE JUSTICE out and wind up destroying my wife and daughters life and drag them through the rocks and mud the media will drag my name through like they did the Weavers? Branch Davidians?

And what would I have accomplished in terms of my mission? Absolutely nothing.

Everything is born, everything dies. Nothing lasts forever, not even five minutes.

Like Voltaire said, I’m gonna tend my garden. I once had a conversation with an old man from Romania who became a naturalized citizen of the US. He told me “I lived under the King of Romania, I lived under Hitler, and then I lived under Stalin. All they ever did was take. What did any of them do for me? Nothing.”

He told me not much changed in terms of perception as a citizen of the USA.

@FF re; Florida –
Where TF are all the FEDS in this story?! When do these Distributor Companies like Cardinal or Masters Pharmaceuticals Inc. face any consequences?! Glad to read some of the Dr.’s got popped – but what a F*n waste. Thank GOD none of my kids got messed up in that sh*T- but I know/knew a few people who did. Love Trump all you want – but this is a clear-cut situation showing a damn good reason to nationalize and de-profitize – healthcare. Capitalism works – but it seems senseless to just let Big Pharma & friends kill off all the customers. Everyone needs access to reasonable basic care. If you want to pay for Boutiqe Fancy Fluff – by all means, pay for it. The quantities that are described here are outrageous! Lot’s of “respectable” folks (Upjohn, Pfizer, Merck, Purdue – dirty bastard) have their fingers in this dirty pie, but FFS – Stop the Biker Menace! Un-F*ng-Believable. All the Pharmecutical companies & distributors should be paying back the Medicaid system. What a crock!

Snow, I have tried to escape NJ since I was 18. But I am Jonah, and NYC is Nineveh and I don’t suppose to understand what the whale is/was.

The Gods have deemed it so. I am 52 years old. I am resigned to work in NJ until I am 62. If I’m lucky, I will retire in Lancaster Pennsylvania. But I will probably die in NJ.

I’m ok with that. In spite of many self inflicted wounds, I’ve lived a very charmed life. I have no regrets.

5 years ago, I seriously contemplated giving myself a lobotomy with a power drill. I’m a happy man, today. There are many people we have read about here on aging rebel who would trade places with me. I wish the Gods had been as kind with them as they have been with me. I’ve learned to not question the Gods.

FF, what’s up man, when I lived in
Southern Alabama back in the 90s there was a few fellows that made regular trips down to Destin to ” see the dr “. They would come back with paper bags full of shit. A good friend told me before he passed away he wished he had never heard of oxcy, worst shit he ever did.
RIP Pat, gone but not forgotten.

unless I misunderstand, this gentleman has not been convicted? but a TV show that quite a few ppl watch is saying that he did it? or is at least implicated?
Presume there will be a disclaimer along Cops lines ‘all suspects are innocent until proven guilty’?
I remember Rebel explaining that most journalists report from the police reports they are given….scary stuff..

ABC appears to be carrying the water for this one. I got chills when Nancy Grace stated the Pagans are ( Felons of the most dangerous sort ) and since we are talking about New Jersey we will have to assume they are not your average garden variety felon like most folks think about

Another interesting side fact that caught my attention is the day they searched his office for alleged Medical Fraud. The Lead FBI Special Agent Daniel G Garrabrant was there.

He is the coordinator for the FBI (CETF) Child Exploitation Task Force

Watched the show. What they showed of kauffman’s suicide note was not much more than ramblings. Joseph Mullholland confessing that Augello was “the boss” of a drug distribution scheme does not a murder make Augello.

For obvious reasons, juries should ignore all testimony from co-defendants that conspire with the prosecution. It’s a wonder that they don’t.

Like everyone else, I’m curious as to what Kaufmans suicide note contains.
Is it like the CI in the Waco case whose testimony was withheld from the defense because “we didnt think he was credible”?
It’s becoming more and more obvious that the govt will stop at nothing to get their desired results- even to a point of putting a presumed innocent man on trial in the court of public opinion.
It seems like all the actors in this play are already dead- why continue the witch hunt?
What a shit show- and even more so by putting it on tv.